


High Profile

by esama



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Gen, Video Game Mechanics, abandoned
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-01
Updated: 2018-06-04
Packaged: 2019-05-16 20:32:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14818370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/esama/pseuds/esama
Summary: Post Grand Temple Desmond lands in a world of superheroes.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Proofread credit to nimadge

He'd meant to keep a low profile. He'd meant to keep his head down and just get his bearings, figure out what's what and what to do and just in general settle himself in – and not do anything whatsoever that might draw attention to him. It was a solid plan, right? Nice and simple.

Then Desmond happens to look left while walking around in the general bustle of New York and for some reason, there's some lunatic gunman on the rooftop of a building across the street with a little kid in a headlock.

It comes out of the blue – no warning and no sign of trouble. Some guy with a gun and a kid in a headlock – and then the guy is aiming at the sky and there are gunshots and suddenly Desmond isn't the only one looking. There are screams, there's shouting, there's running – and there's still a guy with a gun and a kid in a headlock.

"Listen up you little shits!" the gunman shouts down at them. "I want Iron Man, you hear? I want Iron Man, someone fucking bring me Iron Man or the little shit gets it! Listen – LISTEN to me! I want Iron Man, here, now!"

More gunshots while people scream and run for cover. Sirens in the distance – heading away, not towards. Desmond looks around for anyone near – woman hiding in an alleyway, she has a phone, she's calling it in with a shaky voice. Police would be here eventually and since the gunman wants something, he's not likely to harm his hostage until something happened. Police would be able to get there on time and resolve the situation.

He doesn't need to do anything.

"Listen – listen to me!" the gunman shouts, pacing the edge of the roof, dragging the kid with him. The kid is crying – but fighting. They're struggling, kicking their feet and trying to loosen the arm around their neck – but they're maybe seven at most, probably younger, and half of the time their feet don't even reach the rooftop as the man drags them around.

The gunman shakes kid violently to stop their struggles and the kid screams – Desmond takes a step forward.

"I want mother fucking Iron Man here," the gunman shouts, now a bit more desperate. "The asshole has a lot to answer for and –"

The kid squirms, the gunman shakes them in annoyance – and the kid falls. It's like in slow motion – the gunman’s grip loosens and the kid just slips through, lands onto the edge of the roof and then tumbles over it, hands scrabbling for something to hold. For a moment it looks like a clear fall to the pavement but there's a sign on the building’s front – and by some miracle the kid lands on it with a sharp, pained wail. Somehow, the kid manages to hang on – but it's a very, very precarious position.

Desmond was supposed to lay low.

He's already running across the street and up the side of the building before he can think twice, catching on the highest ledge he can once the upward momentum runs out. The gunman is now tearing at his hair, panicking, shouting "shit, shit – shit!" but Desmond ignores him and keeps his eyes on the kid.

It's nearly four stories up to the kid – nothing compared to the churches and cathedrals of Italy, though. This building is badly enough made that he can tear out bricks to make his own handholds if he needs to.

"What the fuck are you doing – stay back!" the gunman shouts. "I'm warning you – I'm going to shoot you!"

Desmond looks up while the gunman aims down – about five floors in between now and kid between them. Damnit. A throwing knife would be handy right now, Desmond thinks and bows his head, thinking fast. Five floors up, that's one hell of a throw. He could loosen a brick from the wall and throw that but it would never make it that distance, gravity is against him there. What does he have that's light enough?

"That's right, asshole, you just go back down like a good boy-"

Fuck it.

Desmond braces himself on his feet on edges of crumbling brickwork with one hand for a support and then reaches for his pocket. One shot – better make it count.

He winds his arm down and then throws his cell phone up as fast and hard as he can. The thing spins madly as it flies through the air – it hits with a sharp crack of breaking electronics and the gunman’s head is thrown up – Desmond nailed him straight to the forehead. The man lets out a cry, stumbles back and then with a snarl leans back forward, "You – you son of a –" landing his foot slightly too forward. Like the kid, he tumbles over the edge – unlike the kid, he does it head first and spinning.

Desmond ignores the falling body and turns all his attention on the kid – who is starting to list slightly to the side, their grip slipping. Having the gunman fall past them had spooked the kid.

"Hold on, kid, I'm coming," Desmond shouts and continues to climb. "Get your legs on the each side of the sign – can you do that for me? Just hold on tight."

The kid isn't listening, they're, no, she is distracted by the noise coming from below. Desmond doesn't look – the gunman must've hit the ground by now. "Don't look down," Desmond calls. "Just hold on."

Then he climbs faster than he ever has, launching off the side of the building and catching onto the bottom edge of the sign – below there are cries of shock and then awe but he ignores them. The kid is looking at him now, she's holding on – she's still safe when Desmond reaches her and can secure an arm around her.

"Are you alright?" Desmond asks while straddling the sign. "Are you hurt? Can you tell me if anyplace hurts, sweetheart?"

"I – I –" she sobs and points to her side, where she'd hit the sign.

Desmond checks it – it's going to be one hell of a bruise and she might've cracked her hip bone but she’s not bleeding. "Okay – can you tell me your name, sweetheart?"

"M-Mel?"

"Okay, Mel, I'm going to get you down from here," Desmond promises while swinging his backpack over his shoulder. "Just hang on a moment, okay?"

It's an awkward adjustment but he manages to make a makeshift harness out of the backpack straps – good enough for her to put her legs through and for Desmond to sling the thing onto his back. It's no climbing harness but it would have to do – and it's better than having her to hang on by her own strength alone. She's already so shaky.

"Now wind your arms tight around my neck and your legs around my waist and squeeze real good," Desmond says. "And I'll get us in the ground as fast as I can, alright? Can you do that for me, Mel?"

She nods against the back of his hoodie and Desmond starts to climb down.

There are clapping by the time he makes it to the ground. The street traffic has been stopped by cars stopping to watch and somewhere in the distance there are police sirens again – this time coming towards, rather than going away. NY city police on the ball again, once more.

Ignoring the things people are shouting at him – and trying not to wince too hard at the many phone cameras aimed his way – Desmond crouches down to let Mel off his back, easing the backpack straps off and then letting her loose from them. She sways with that support gone for a moment and then breaks out into tears – all Desmond can do is gather her into his arms and rock her slightly, muttering, "It's okay, you're okay, you're safe."

He should be getting away. The hood he has on is barely enough to conceal his identity and even so, there are cameras still on him – people are recording this stuff. Shit, he should be getting away, disappearing into the crowd – or just running away until he found a crowd he could disappear to. This one was still applauding him.

"Let us through, let us through!" an authoritative voice calls and people part ways to let some police officers through, and Mel is huddling into Desmond's chest still crying – and he doesn't get away.

* * *

 

Well, at least the videos they took of him look cool as heck. Desmond gets to see a lot of them as the people who watched – and recorded – the whole thing happen, share their footage with the police officers to keep them from arresting him. God bless modern technology – they have good dozen angles on the whole thing, and in each one, the same thing happens.

Man in a white hoodie runs across traffic, up a wall and then does "a death-defying" climb up several stories worth of building.

"And you didn't know the gunman from before?" the officer asks while Desmond sits in the back of an ambulance with Mel, who is huddling in a blanket with a juice box and a lollipop and brand new teddy-bear. "Was he on your radar, did you have forewarning, anything?"

"No, I just saw him and saw Mel across the street and figured I should do something about it quickly," Desmond answers a bit awkwardly. This is the first time he's dealt with police officers and he's not entirely sure this is going well. He's not entirely sure how this is going.

"Alright," the officer says and makes a note of it on his pad. "And you threw your phone at the gunman to take him out?" he then asks somewhat incredulously.

"It was the only thing I had which was light enough to make the throw," Desmond answers with a shrug. His phone had been recovered from the street afterwards, completely ruined – screen cracked, corner bent, no question about whether it would work again.

Desmond turns the broken thing in his gloved hand sadly. It didn't have a SIM card or anything, even the WIFI was disabled, so it wasn't much use as a phone. But it did have photos and video and all of it's gone now.

 "That was hell of a thing you did, son," the officer says, shaking his head. "And one hell of a throw."

"Someone's already uploaded it to Youtube," another officer, a woman, says while flicking a thumb over her own phone screen. "You've already been given a name."

Desmond frowns and looks up. "A name," he repeats and pushes his broken phone to his pocket before someone thinks to demand it back as evidence.

"Yeah," the officer says and holds her phone out, to show the youtube video playing on her phone screen – titled just, White Hood the Hardcore Parkour Man!

 "Er," Desmond says, eloquent. Because, what?

"Yeah, it's kind of bad," she says and shrugs, turning back to her phone. "Maybe it won't stick. Maybe you can comment on it what you actually wanna be called – but you better hurry, boy. These things get decided fast."

Desmond looks between her and the other police officer – a third is talking quietly to Mel to get her details to call her parents. The body of the gunman – who had not survived the near eight-story fall he'd taken from the roof to the ground – has already been taken away and a tarp has been put over the smear he'd left on the pavement. There is still a crowd milling about behind the quickly erected police line but…

This is going a bit weird, isn't it?

For one, Desmond is still wearing his hood and no one's asked him to take it off. And for a second, no one has asked his name yet, or what he was doing, or why. It's… it's not how these things are supposed to go. Right?

"Right," the first officer says and puts his little pad away. "Listen, we really appreciate you sticking around to answer some questions, but you better clear away now. The reporters will be here soon, and it's a little less paperwork on our part if we don't have to deal with the breach of a secret identity while we're at it."

Desmond blinks at him. Breach of what? "I – alright," he says. Really not how these things go on television. "Happy to help I guess. You'll take care of Mel now?"

"Yeah, we'll get her parents and get to the bottom line of this," the police promise. "Right now it looks like the gunman snatched the first hostage he could, but we'll make sure she's alright."

"Alright," Desmond says and then tilts his head back to look at Mel – who has her face buried in her new Teddy Bear. "I'll be going now, Mel?" he says and reaches to pat her shoulder. "You'll be alright with these people, okay?"

She nods mutely, still shaking a little. Desmond looks her over but… he's really not equipped to dealing with children, and she'd be alright with authorities. Unlike him, the alien with no identity to speak of and apparently no idea how police procedures with random acts of heroics go.

Desmond gets up from the ambulance – the police officers nod to him and let him go, just like that. It's a bit… weird, it's a lot weird, to just walk away from the situation. Don't they want him for questioning or anything? Apparently not. Okay then.

Grabbing his backpack and adjusting the straps back to normal lengths, Desmond shoulders the thing and heads off. People applaud him when he goes, shouting encouraging things like, "Damn that was cool," and "well done man, well done," and so on. It's really goddamn weird.

"Hey, hey, Mr. Hero, wait," someone shouts after him. "You have a name we can tag you as?"

Desmond hesitates – he's still not sure what the hell that is even supposed to mean, but considering that the name the Youtube video had given him was White Hood… yeah, he's definitely not going around being called that. "I'm an Assassin," Desmond answers – fuck it, he earned that title. "Use that."

Then he gets the hell out of there before people can figure out their supposed hero has a bad guy name.

* * *

 

He makes the news – for the briefest moment of time and only locally, maybe, but he makes the news. It's even on the front page of bunch of New York newspapers – with a shot of him climbing the wall or picture of him sitting on the sign with Mel, with titles like; "The Assassin Joins Ranks of NY Superheroes," and "New Hero in the Hood," which is ludicrous and then there's Daily Bugle and, "Newest Menace Upon the Streets – an Assassin Loose on Manhattan!"

Desmond even glimpses a morning talk show on the storefront of a electronics shop, talking about him. "The Assassin," the host says. "Now there's a name to unpack. Is it personal history, or a young up and coming hero taking on more than they can chew? What is it that makes a good superhero name? That and more today on…"

This place, Desmond finds, is a bit... different.

He's already figured out that something about the history of this world is off – waking up a completely ruined Grand Temple which looked like someone had trashed it millennia ago was big clue there. Another was Abstergo, or rather, the complete lack of Abstergo. It just doesn't exist here. He'd checked, he'd made a complete nuisance out of himself in couple pharmacies, checking labels on pill bottles. Not a single medicine here had Abstergo's logo on it.

Quick peek into Google through a library computer confirmed it – there was no Abstergo in anywhere this world's history.

Desmond thought that would be the weirdest thing about this world – the apparent lack of the company that ran it and the absence of the shadow organisation behind it all. He's still not sure if Assassins are a thing either – somehow he doubts it. That should be enough, right? But no, it isn't, somehow that really isn't it.

Instead here there are superheroes, world ending invasions and, oh, aliens. Aliens. Alien gods from outer space that orchestrated alien invasions.

Desmond leans back from the newspaper and it's four spread wide coverage of the Battle of New York and takes a moment just to breathe. Well, it explains the whole secret identity and hero thing and why the police didn't ask for his details. Apparently there is a precedence. But also, what?

What even is this? And what the hell is he supposed to do with it?

* * *

 

Desmond is still in the New York Public Library, having moved away from the computers and to the history section, when the answer sort of comes to him. He's trying to find Assassins in the history – with not only little luck but with some worrisome conclusions about history – when he's approached by a man in black suit, men in black style.

"Mr. Assassin?" the man asks quietly. "May I have a moment of your time?"

Desmond blinks at the book on Italian Renaissance – which apparently went ever so slightly different from what he remembers – and looks up with a bit of surprise. The man in a suit smiles at him unassumingly, his whole read oddly civilian, and Desmond slowly closes the book, concentrating his vision.

The man in a suit shows blue in Eagle Vision – no hostile intentions then, at least not yet. No wonder he didn't feel the man approach. That's something, at least. The man is carrying a gun, though – three, actually, one at his hip, other under his jacket and last at his ankle, and combat knife to boot. His body language still isn't hostile, or even wary – it's open, easygoing. Friendly even.

Desmond glances around – there, the suited man isn't alone. There's an Asian woman sitting not far, pretending to read a beauty magazine – she's keeping an eye on them. She's more battle ready and tense but even she's glowing blue, not red. On standby in case of a fight breaking out, but not openly hostile towards him. Huh.

"Sure," Desmond says finally, if a bit warily. He hadn't exactly been hiding, enjoying the fact that without Abstergo he didn't need to stick to the shadows, but… this is a bit soon. "I think I can spare a moment, Mr…?"

"Coulson – Agent Coulson, from Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistic Division," the man says and offers a hand. "Or SHIELD."

"… right," Desmond answers and takes the hand, shaking it briefly - making no move to remove his gloves first. "Good to meet you."

"Likewise," the man says and motions to the chair beside him. "May I?"

"Go ahead," Desmond shrugs, leaning back a little and pushing the history book back. Agent Coulson takes a seat across from him, still smiling – it might be his resting face, actually. "So, what can I do for you, Agent Coulson?"

"Answer a few questions concerning your intentions and future plans, first of all," Coulson says. "You're new to the city?"

"Relatively," Desmond answers, glancing around for exits. He's pretty sure he can get out of here if he needs to.

"Are you looking to stay?"

"Maybe."

Coulson's eyebrow twitches slightly at that, but the smile doesn't falter – if it's amusement or annoyance, it's hard to tell. "Do you consider yourself a hero or an antihero?"

Desmond snorts at that, unable to help himself. "Do people actually intentionally go for the anti-hero gig?" he asks incredulously and then wonders – are superhero comics a thing here, is Batman a thing? He's pretty sure Gotham isn't a real place even here, but…

"It tends to happen as a side effect of choices and past events and chosen method of confronting problems and enemies," Coulson says amiably and gives him a look. "The hood and your chosen name have some implications, you understand."

No, he really doesn't. None of this makes much sense to Desmond – it kind of feels like maybe he's dreaming all of this. Or stuck in the weirdest and vaguely childish Animus simulation or something. None of this is really all that realistic.

"Right," Desmond says anyway. "Well, I don't consider myself anything right now. Hero or otherwise."

"You did a heroic thing," Coulson comments.

"I helped out where I knew I could," Desmond says. "Anyone would've, right, if they had the capability?"

Coulson looks at him, arching his eyebrows. "I think that's the very definition of a hero."

Desmond arches his eyebrows right back. He's pretty sure it takes more than that? But what does he know; his world doesn't have superheroes – just villains and professional killers. "If you say so," he says. "That's a pretty low barrier of entry if you ask me."

"Well, entry is easy," Coulson agrees. "Sticking with is infinitely harder, we've found. What are your plans now, Mr. Assassin?"

"It's… just the Assassin, not Mr. It's a title, not my given name," Desmond says, shaking his head and looking away – at the Asian woman. Every now and then she glances their way, not very surreptitious. Still blue. "You here to see if I will be doing more heroics?"

"Will you?" Coulson asks, leaning his elbows onto the table and looking at the book Desmond had been reading.

"I… guess, if I run into another situation like that, maybe," Desmond admits, and tugs at the strings of his hood idly. He hadn't meant to become a hero and he has no real intention of becoming a superhero or whatever – but if he runs into another hostage situation like that… yeah, he might very well try to do something about it. He's sat on his hands long enough, really.

"Hmm," Coulson hums, looking up to him. "You don't have a mission, do you?"

An assassination contract, Desmond thinks first and then frowns. That’s probably not it. "How do you mean?" he asks.

"People tend to become superheroes for a reason – like Tony Stark's famous vendetta against Ten Rings, for example. Do you have anything of the sort? Enemies, vendettas… quests?"

Desmond very carefully tries to look like he knows what that's supposed to mean. "Not that I know of," he says slowly. "And I didn't really become anything – I just helped the kid out, that's all. I wasn't… doing a debut or whatever."

"An opportunity hero then," Coulson says. "You chose a name, though."

"Well they were going to call me White Hood," Desmond answers and rolls his eyes. "How are those implications?"

Coulson tilts his head in silent you might have point there. "Assassin is a rather hefty title to claim," he comments then. "You must understand it raises some concerns. There is also that rather efficient way you dispatched the gunman – by using only a cellular phone, I understand."

Desmond shrugs. "It's all I had," he says.

"You carry a knife."

Good eyes on this guy. "Yeah, but it's not a throwing knife," Desmond answers and folds his arms. "And it's too big to make that far up in straight line. My phone was lighter and a little less likely to cause innocent casualties if it fell the wrong way."

Coulson arches his brows at that, interested and maybe little impressed. "And if you had a throwing knife?" he asks curiously.

"Well I wouldn't have trashed my only phone, that's for sure," Desmond mutters and then sighs. "What is it that you want, Agent Coulson?"

Coulson doesn't answer immediately, watching him thoughtfully. Then he smiles a little wider – he's never quite stopped smiling. The man has weaponized amiable friendliness, seriously. "The agency I am part of often deals with superheroes and enhanced individuals and we like to get a read on any new ones that pop up," he admits. "And so far we know very little of you. In essence, I am here to build your file, Assassin, and to mark you down as either friendly, someone to be watched, or… hostile. Which one do you think you are?"

Huh. That was surprising bit of honesty. "I guess the middle one, so far," Desmond admits. "I don't know anything about you, so I can't promise friendly. But so far you've been decent, so I'm going to try to do the same."

Coulson practically beams at him. "Much appreciated," he says. "Would you like to learn more?"

"Of… your agency?" Desmond asks.

"We also recruit heroes," Coulson explains. "In fact, number of them work for us – Tony Stark himself is a consultant for SHIELD."

Desmond gives him a flat look. Working for a what looks like secret agency he knows nothing about… "That's a nice offer but I'll pass for now, thanks," he says.

"Pity," Coulson says but smiles; no hard feelings there, then. "Are you willing to answer more questions for the sake of building up a full profile?"

"Depends on the questions," Desmond answers, looking him over. He kinda likes the guy, despite himself. And if this world works like he's kind of starting to think it might… it would probably be to his benefit to be bit more open now – and not make these people suspicious and wary of him this early in whatever game this is. As it is, so far Coulson hasn't asked him anything too bad.

Desmond leans back in his chair and nods. "What do you want to know?"


	2. Chapter 2

He hadn't really meant to actually stick with the superhero thing because first of all, _really_ superheroes? And second of all, how often do you really run into the sort of situations where anyone needs to be a hero, much less a superhero? Really honestly now, how often does someone really need to stop crime or accident or whatever, really?

Desmond ends up running into a situation where he has to stop crime and an accident the very same week after that incident with Mel and the gunman.

He's walking home from the library – which he's decided to stick to for his initial research about this place because it's the library and unfortunately he doesn't have Shaun Hastings and Rebecca Crane to do his research for him here – when he spots the red glow in the crowd. He's used to the blue glow of the shadows from the SHIELD – they're the reason he's flashing Eagle Vision about every so often, checking their locations. The SHIELD shadows have been semi-decent about the whole thing, not really butting into his business and keeping their distance, so he doesn't really mind. Red ones are different things entirely.

The people glowing red are a couple of men, idly sidling their way towards a bank he's passing by, their heads hooded and their hands in their pockets – holding guns.

Desmond looks after them with interest and then looks up, considering whether he should or not. On one hand – bank robbery, that's not really something an Assassin should get involved in. On other hand, men with guns and hostile intentions. And right after them, there's a mother dragging with her two kids, who heads into the bank right after the two men.

Desmond breathes in and out and then tugs his hood up and heads for the bank – SHIELD shadows close at his heel.

It's a small bank, nothing like the big ones downtown – but it's crowded by people queuing up for the cashiers, their mumbling and chatter filling the space with the quiet droning of noise. About twenty, twenty-three people, plus the cashiers, the would-be-robbers, and the mother and her kids who are taking the end of the shortest queue.

The gunmen are sizing up the place, hands still in their pockets, still holding onto their guns. Still glowing red. Desmond glances around while mingling into the nearest queue – it doesn't look like there's more of them here, at least not yet. Just these two. Chances are they would have a getaway vehicle en route, or on standby though, that tends to be how it goes…

Still, better not let the whole thing escalate.

Desmond assumes a partially bored and partially annoyed body language and then moves forward, murmuring "Excuse me," as he sidles past a man with a briefcase as if to move to another queue. He then moves to the last one – and right next to the would-be-gunmen, taking cover in the crowd of people, mingling in with the best of his ability. In the corner of his eye, he can see the SHIELD agents, entering the bank.

Then he's right behind gunmen. He could knife them both, dual wielding style, it would be even easy – but that would probably be bad all things considered. These guys haven't yet taken their guns out, never mind threatening people. So…

Desmond grabs them by the neck and before they can do more than yelp in surprise, he slams their heads together.

The _noise_ that results from that action is overwhelming – people recoiling with surprise and then with alarm as the gunmen crumble to the polished marble floor. Desmond ignores the cacophony around him and instead crouches after the men and quickly picks their pockets for guns, unclips the magazines and checks the chambers to make sure there are no rounds in before holding them out to the very alarmed SHIELD agents somewhere behind him.

"Holy shit, is that the Assassin?" someone mutters.

"Did he just kill those dudes?"

"Did anyone get that on video?"

The SHIELD agents confusedly and worriedly accept the guns and magazines he's holding and Desmond turns back to the gunmen, considering them. Unconscious is not incapacitated, he decides, and then strips both men off their belts before using the said belts to tie both men's hands. Better than nothing.

"Sir," one of the SHIELD agents says warily. "What –"

And then a car curves in front of the bank, a van, side door already thrown open – the getaway vehicle. Desmond looks to it through the glass doors and then to the SHIELD agents. "Do you want to deal with that or should I?" he asks. It just seems polite.

They just stare at him, wide-eyed.

"Alright," Desmond says and gets up to his feet. "I'll be right back, then."

* * *

 

No one got the Bank Takedown on video – but the security footage of it does eventually end up in the news and from there, obviously, to Youtube. The Van Takedown, however, did get captured by someone's phone camera – including Desmond on the roof, swinging inside through a freshly broken side window to knock the driver out and stop the van before it ran into a newspaper stand.

It's all together bit more action than Desmond was really looking to get into just yet – it also makes him weirdly nostalgic for Leonardo da Vinci all of sudden. Somehow most of Ezio's carriage chases ended up involving Leonardo. It's a pity Desmond doesn't have a friendly artist studio to hide away in – he really could use it, even if the smell of thinners and oil paints always gave Ezio a headache.

"Mr Assassin, Mr Assassin! Please, a word!"

"Did you know that the bank robbery was about to occur, were you tipped beforehand?"

"Did you know the robbers?!"

"Are you here to assassinate someone?!"

Desmond ignores the shouting of reporters behind the police line best he can while the gunmen are being carted away off to a police car, and Coulson is talking amiably with the officers who got the pleasure of handling the situation.

"You seem to be getting off to a good start," a female voice comments and Desmond looks up from where he's sitting, in the back of an open police van. He's not under arrest or anything, and he's already answered the questions the police were willing to ask – which wasn't much – but he's not sure what he's supposed to do now. This whole superhero business is just weird.

There's a woman sashaying towards him, redhead and vaguely familiar, dressed in the neat suit. She smiles – it looks a lot like the edge of a blade, her smile – and offers a hand. "Natasha Romanoff," she says. "Agent of SHIELD."

"Pleasure," Desmond answers and shakes her hand.

She smiles a little wider, looking him over. "You're not putting much effort into hiding your identity," she comments. "But I suppose that's no problem when you have no identity to hide."

Desmond tilts his head slightly to look at her more closely past the edge of his hood – there are still people taking pictures off him, so he's in no hurry to reveal his face fully. "Is that a critique?" he asks slowly, eying her _aura._

Romanoff is mostly blue, but it's very red-tinted blue, almost purple. Her body language is nowhere as easy and as open as Coulson's either – instead, she's wound tight like a spring, and standing just so on her high heels that it makes Desmond worry she could roundhouse kick him any moment. She's ready fight him, even looking forward to it.

"How did you know the robbery was going to happen?" Romanoff asks, idly folding her arms, superficially calm and at ease.

"I saw the guys, I saw they had guns," Desmond answers and shrugs, shifting his shoulders. If she'd move to kick him, he'd block her with an arm, aim her kick to the side, get off the van, get some space. "It seemed like an obvious conclusion."

"Good eye," she comments and rocks slightly on the balls of her feet, adjusting her centre of weight before resting it on her left heel. Low kick instead, aiming at his right knee – looking to incapacitate him first.

Desmond shrugs and leans to rest his elbows on his knees. "It's served me well," he says, wondering what would happen if he grabbed her foot mid kick and twisted it – would it break or would she spin. She'd probably spin. "Shouldn't I have done something?"

"You tell me," Romanoff says, glancing at his gloved hands and then smiling. She loosens her folded arms and holds them in front of her instead, idly grasping right wrist in the left hand. Blow to the head first, aiming for his neck – she'd miss and go for temples instead, looking to disorientate him. "Why did you move in to action? Something to prove?"

Desmond looks at her and then stands up – he's much taller than her, but it doesn't seem to bother her much at all, she doesn't so much as twitch an eyelash. "If you saw what I did, would you stand by and do nothing?" he asks, not quite on the offensive yet, but just as ready to make the first move as she, now.

Romanoff's expression doesn't change, but she tucks her chin in a little, looking up at him from under her brows, a very dry and sarcastic _please_ if there ever was one. Protecting her throat too, even as one of her feet slides slightly to the side, going ever so slightly on the guard. "Man of your abilities helping out the little guy," she says. "There has to be a reason. You claim to be an assassin – what kind of assassin stops bank robberies and saves little girls?"

Oh? _Oh_. Desmond leans back a little and then glances towards Coulson – who's watching them from the side, too far to overhear though. Other people are keeping their distance too, giving them space. Whether it's by design or some show of respect, it's hard to say, but…

"Nothing is true," Desmond says and looks at Romanoff closely.

She doesn't answer, her expression fixed, not so much as eyelid twitching – she's thinking hard though, trying to figure out what it means… but she doesn't know. She doesn't answer.

She might be an assassin, but she's not an _Assassin_.

"Right," Desmond says, a little disappointed – he'd figured that he might be the only one in this world before, when he wasn't immediately taken down when the title of Assassin went public. But for a moment there he'd almost… "Never mind," he says and smiles sheepishly. "Was there something you wanted, Ms Romanoff?"

She's watching him warily now, confused and bothered having missed something. "An Assassin stopping street-level crime," she says slowly – clued in on the importance now, she puts weight on the word, even though she doesn't know the significance. "It seems a bit of a waste really. Any chance you're looking for something on your actual skill level?"

"You mean assassinations?" Desmond asks, his smile fading quick.

"Not necessarily," she says smoothly – it was definitely what she meant, but she's backtracking fast. "SHIELD is known for establishing contracts, bringing in consultants – using outside labour. There are occasionally situations and… issues we would like to see handled, but don't necessarily have the manpower for."

"Or legal standing?" Desmond guesses dryly.

Romanoff tilts her head in quiet, wry agreement. "So say if something was stolen, or something needed to be investigated," she says, "a person needed to be found, perhaps questioned… that sort of thing. Would that be something you'd be capable or willing to consider? You would be compensated of course."

It's like a two-fold déjà vu, hitting him all at once. Suddenly it feels like he's a kid back in Florence, sneaking towards a pigeon coop for the first time, unfolding his first assassination contract from the Medici – or picking up a little side mission off the street, to beat up a cheating husband or deliver a piece of the letter for a scorned lover. He's back in Boston, at the Homestead, doing little missions for the people… fetching and delivering, destroying and rebuilding…

"Huh," Desmond murmurs, looking away for a moment. Holy shit, he's become the main character of his own life finally. And all it took was for him to die and end up in alternate world… and wind up all alone with no backup or Brotherhood to rely on.

Though, isn't that how it goes for them all – they can only become true Assassins once they're the only ones left.

"What?" Romanoff asks.

"I'm just wondering where the hell will I build my hideout," Desmond mutters and then shakes his head. "Never mind. Yeah, I would be willing to consider that, taking contracts. With the caveat that I will refuse any mission I don't want to do, of course."

"Of course," Romanoff says, frowning, watching him closely – probably building up a mental file of his body language or whatever. Desmond doesn't even care.

He's too busy wondering about how to start up an armoury, really.

* * *

 

Who is more confused about the whole ordeal in the end, Desmond isn't sure. Romanoff and Coulson come around a day later when Desmond is leaving the library after having spent another good eight hours reading up on history, and then they take him to a diner to conduct him into the business of taking contracts from SHIELD. The whole thing is… it's something.

"You don't have a library card?" Romanoff asks while they slide into the booth and gives him a knowing look. "Identity issues?"

Desmond shrugs. "I like the atmosphere there."

"It makes for a weird public image, you realise – a superhero in a public library," she comments. "Superhero by the name of an _Assassin_."

"Eh," Desmond answers and shrugs again. "What can you do. So, what do you have for me?"

"I don't suppose you still have a permanent residence," Coulson comments while taking out a folder and handing it over.

Desmond shakes his head – he sleeps on rooftops and construction sites when he gets tired. It's worked for him before and it works for him still. And doesn't leave paper trails – which, granted, doesn't seem to matter much here…

"You mentioned something about a hideout," Romanoff comments, leaning in curiously

"Well if I get one, I won't be telling you," Desmond answers and opens the folder he's being given. "That's kind of the point of a _hideout_. They're _hidden._ "

"Mm-hmm," Romanoff answers, arching a brow. She's fiddling with a knife somewhat suggestively – Desmond can almost feel the ghost of an impact at his neck. "SHIELD could help you with that, you know."

"I'm sure they could," Desmond agrees, giving her a look and tilting the folder. It has nice stiff covers – it would serve well as a shield and being slapped by it would hurt like a bitch.

Romanoff smiles and sets the knife down.

Coulson rolls his eyes at them. "Something to consider later, maybe," he suggests. "Well, please take your time looking over our offer."

"Hm," Desmond answers and leans back to read.

It's… more or less what he expected. Very basic stuff really. Mission to track down a suspected trader of stolen technology before the technology could be sold – namely, Chitauri technology recovered from New York post-battle. Another mission to spy on some criminal gang which they suspect is in possession of some very overpowered weapons or maybe even enhanced individuals. A mission to steal information from someone – specifically, their phone – without being noticed… and so on.

Damn, but it feels like coming home… which might actually say a lot about what he considers _normal_ at this point, really. All he's missing is infiltration mission, courier mission, assassination contract and maybe a secret lair to explore and he'd be all set.

Desmond leafs through the pages, smiling a little wistfully. The missions are all pretty simple and straightforward, really. Well, the spy mission might be a bit more difficult, but… still, for a spy agency, it's all pretty simple. There are no assassinations here, either, all of these can probably be done with just stealth. They're testing him, which is not surprising. Anyone would.

Still, part of him can't help but think; _tutorial missions._  Rebecca's Animus had totally fucked up his worldview, huh?

"Well?" Romanoff asks.

"I'll take it," Desmond says and shrugs.

"… which one would that be?" Coulson asks politely, smiling.

Desmond looks up. "The folder," he says and closes the said folder. "I'll take the whole set."

Romanoff's eyebrows arch at that – not what they'd been expecting them. "Great," she says anyway. "That's _great._ "

Coulson smiles a little wider – weaponized friendliness not so much faltering. "And when can we expect results?"

Desmond considers. All the missions are set in New York, so… no need to count in travel time. He can do most of them that same day, probably, and the rest tomorrow. "Give me a couple of days," he says and stands up. "I'll head to the library once I'm done."

"Great," Romanoff says again, shaking her head and making a slightly incredulous face. "We'll be looking forward to it."

"Do you…" Coulson starts and then looks him over and then smiles. "Right. We'll see you in a couple of days."

Desmond nods and heads off – smiling a little as he goes. This, he thinks, is going to be fun.

"What the hell was that?" he hears Romanoff mutter behind him. "Did he even look at the pay?"

"Hm," Coulson answers. "I wonder…"

* * *

 

Maybe this is how the whole map function came to be in Animus, Desmond muses while balancing on top of the Chrysler Building. He's never before given that much thought about why exactly climbing tall buildings made it easier to keep in sync with his ancestors. But… it actually has a real-life function and maybe they found out about it too and maybe they did it for a good reason.

Sitting on top of the building and activating the Eagle Vision… it's something else in real life. Not actually all that different from how it was in Animus, really. It's like part of the city seeps into his head and he just knows the streets below, the buildings – all the points of interest. There is no actual map he can bring forth by magic – but he _knows_ this area now.

He even knows now that there's a not so reputable black market weapons dealer not far from where he is and he could probably buy some decent knives from the guy. And there's a hacker working the other way, and he could probably get some service he could use from them.

Eagle Vision had always been a bit _much_ when it came to reality. In Animus, it felt like a game mechanic, but in real life, it was closer to freaking psychic ability than something… realistic. This though, this is worse. Like psychic area clairvoyance. Or something. A bit like actual freaking magic.

Now if the Eagle Vision magic offered him a magical pile of hay to do a Leap of Faith into, that would be nice, but…

Desmond looks down dubiously – and there, glowing white under Eagle Vision, a truck with open back loaded with what looks like plastic bags.

 _No way_. The Chrysler Building is over thousand feet tall to its highest antenna – he would know, he freaking climbed it all. If he makes that jump in real life, he's going to actually _die_.

Still, the truck is glowing white – a safe, welcoming white of hay piles and flower carts and it’s even conveniently stopped in traffic lights. How many times in how many bodies did he jump into that exact shade of white without so much as getting winded by it? That was simulation though – this is real life. Real life has _gravity_ and _terminal velocity_ and _bones to break._

Desmond stares at it for a long moment. Still not moving, still glowing white. Seriously.

Well, it's not called Leap of _Faith_ for nothing, is it?

* * *

 

Desmond climbs a few more viewpoints, building up a mental map and whole repertoire of not so legal city services which might be useful for him, before taking on the first – the closest mission. The thief mission, as it happens – one of his favourites from back when he was doing Ezio.

He gets a viewpoint on the area where his target might be and then searches the crowd with Eagle Vision until something glows golden. It's not the target – his target is a man, this person is a woman – but his instincts have been right so far and this is how it usually went for the others too. Find someone who will lead you to the person you want – or who might have information you need. Somehow, Eagle Vision always can tell when someone's important and mark them out like that.

Thinking about it now, as it's happening in actual reality… it really is a bit clairvoyant, isn't it? How the hell can his eyes know something his mind doesn't?

Maybe the Eagle Vision is actually a superpower, Desmond muses and then gets down to ground level to do some shadowing. There's a bit of a crowd on the street – it's easy to blend into the background, sneaking closer and closer to the important person until he's in a hearing distance. The woman is talking to a phone.

"… I know he is, I know, I'm sorry, it's my bad," she says. "But the appetisers will be there right on time, four o'clock on the double? So it's just the actual dinner service that will be late, okay – but it will be ready to go before seven o'clock? That's good, good – no, of course not. I understand. Yes? No, of course not – there's a backdoor – the address is…"

Desmond ducks his head a little, pressing the address to his memory – and the woman's glow fades into grey. The address was all he needed then.

Time to move on.

* * *

 

Desmond ends up stealing clothes from someone's hotel room – they'd conveniently left a window open – and then slipping into what looks like someone's engagement celebration. It's not his target's, thank god, but the target is a guest and while Desmond carefully avoids being noticed by sliding around the fringes of the party, his target gives a speech. Best Man, then.

"… it's like they say," the best man target says. "Jack and Jill went up the hill. As they did. And then they came down with snowboards and nearly broke each other's legs," people laugh, apparently inside joke, and seriously, the couple's names are Jack and Jill? "And then us poor suckers – namely me and lovely maid of honour over there, hey Betty, how you doing? – had to watch them bicker with each other over hospital beds…"

Desmond laughs with the rest of the crowd and carefully eases his way into the throng of people – and closer to his target and the cell phone glowing golden in the man's pocket. The target – whose name is Matt it turns out – finishes giving the speech in honour of his friends and then slips away to get a drink while people applaud and the Maid of Honour takes a turn at the microphone.

Matt is turning to talk with someone else, another friend of his and the future groom's – they're laughing and turning together to listen to the maid of honour. Desmond sidles behind them.

"So, is she single?" the other man asks.

"Betty? Nah, she's _way_ taken – and gay to boot," Matt the Best Man says. "And you should see her girlfriend, man, she's something else."

"Oh _really_? Any luck they're looking for a third?"

"Honestly man, with your face? I wouldn't even try."

Desmond smothers a snort at the hurt look the second man gives and then moves away – Matt's phone safely in his own pocket as he heads off, and away from the party.

* * *

 

Desmond flicks curiously through Matt's phone while heading to his next mission site, the SIM-card carefully removed to keep the guy from remotely turning it off. Thankfully the guy had a slide pattern lock on the thing – easy enough for Eagle Vision to see. The phone is full of rather interesting stuff, all around. No wonder SHIELD wants it.

Turns out Matt the Best Man deals some not so legal drugs in the dark web on the side of running an investment business – drugs which seem to give people some superhuman abilities and also possibly strokes and heart attacks. Drugs produced by his uncle the chemist who used to work for something called Oscorp. Oscorp which, apparently, does stuff like that.

To think Desmond would ever feel nostalgic for goddamn Abstergo but there it is, a déjà vu all over again. Oscorp is a lot smaller than Abstergo ever was, granted, but it seems their ideals line up here and there rather nicely. It's enough to make him feel vaguely nauseous.

Ugh.

Next up, tracking down a trader of stolen alien technology – and also their shipment. There's even a permission to blow it all up if it cannot be safely retrieved.

All in all, his career as a working Assassin is getting off to a great start.


	3. Chapter 3

Shaun Hastings is a tenure-track professor at Cambridge, teaching history and enjoying pretty decent Twitter following among his students, thanks to his rather sarcastic tweets – a lot of them about the said students’ exam answers. His most popular tweet is, "'On this date a bloke did a thing' is not an acceptable answer, Mr Jones; I don't care if it's technically accurate." After which people retweeted a lot of "it's technically accurate," tweets at him.  
  
Rebecca Crane runs a private cyber-security company, fixing and installing firewalls and antivirus programs for semi-high end businesses and running about half dozen white-hat hacker trials on the side. She's also credited for the backtrack of some hacker who'd momentarily messed with some government sites and has even a note about it on her website – looks like it boosted her business a lot.   
  
Lucy Stillman does not exist, as far as internet is concerned. Desmond has tried every possible search term and engine, but though he comes up with a lot of Lucys and lot of Stillmans, the specific Lucy Stillman does not pop up. Neither does the entire Miles family as Desmond knows it – and Desmond doubts it's just because as Assassins they never had that much of a paper or online trail. Still…   
  
A bit sad.   
  
Desmond leans away from the computer and looks over his shoulder as Coulson approaches him from the side. "Afternoon," Desmond says and closes the search window. "I've been waiting."   
  
"We had to verify some things," Coulson says and looks down to the box sitting next to Desmond on the floor. For once, he's not smiling – he actually looks a bit troubled.   
  
"Okay then," Desmond says and turns the swivel chair around to face the man. It's late in the library – near closing time really – and there aren't enough people around to mind if they talk out loud. "Well, I completed your folder," he says and motions to the box. "Couldn't get the tech away, but I got you all the hard drives, memory sticks and chips I could find, figure you can do something with those at least. There's a shipping manifest there too. There's also Matt Calloway's phone in there – I wrote my notes on the Redbones on it, since my own phone got busted the other day…"   
  
Coulson looks at him seriously, while Desmond lists the loot he'd gotten from his missions. It's not much, all things considered – really makes him miss Italy and the concrete feeling of looting bunches of florins from enemy strongholds – but that's modern day for you. Looting bills just didn't have that same concrete feel that jingling of fat coin purse did.   
  
The agent is not saying anything anyway, just staring at him, and it's getting a little creepy. "What?" Desmond finally asks.   
  
Coulson pushes his hands into his pockets. "Why did you do this?"   
  
Desmond frowns. "You… offered me a contract and I took it?" he asks.   
  
"The pay was barely worth your effort," Coulson points out. "You completed several missions, not the easiest possible we could've given for you, for mere couple thousand dollars. Why bother?"   
  
Desmond swivels on the chair a bit, side to side, wondering. Yeah, all told the missions he'd done amounted only to about two thousand dollars worth of pay. He hadn't even bothered to check the pay for the missions though, because… that's just how it went, with these things, right? The first missions always paid pennies. And it'd never been about the mission pay anyway – it was about what he could loot while doing the missions.   
  
Which he had actually – the Redbones gang were a whole suitcase of money lighter right now, and the illegal tech trader was probably regretting running a cash-only business. Desmond hadn't counted the money there yet, but it was a lot more than what the SHIELD was paying him.   
  
But how much would've it cost SHIELD to do what he'd done – in paid man-hours, used vehicles, surveillance equipment… and that only if nothing went wrong and they did not end up in a gunfight…   
  
"Well, why not?" Desmond asks, shrugging, and looking at the man curiously. "You offered and I didn't have anything more interesting on, so… why not?"   
  
Coulson presses his lips together and then takes something from his pocket. Two envelopes – one fat with what's obviously money, the other slim. "For services rendered," he says, handing the money envelope over. Desmond checks it – not as much as he looted, but a lot more than just two thousand dollars. Neat.   
  
"And," Coulson continues. "An invitation of sorts."   
  
"... okay?" Desmond asks and takes the slim envelope, opening it under Coulson's gaze and looking it over. Apparently, they're holding a sort of get-together for superheroes at the Stark Tower, a sort of conference really – there's even a list for speakers and speeches, namely by Mr Stark, Captain Rogers, and Natasha Romanoff, which is… interesting. There is also offered dinner and drink service.   
  
"Orientation for new superheroes?" Desmond guesses and glances up.   
  
"You could see it that way," Coulson agrees. "We've come to the conclusion that the better superheroes are informed of each other – and each other's territories, abilities and interests – the fewer misunderstandings there will be, and fewer unfortunate overlap between interests."   
  
"Uh-huh," Desmond answers and swivels in the chair side to side. "Considering that superheroes are what they are, this seems like a good way to get a whole lot of them killed."   
  
"Stark Tower has state of the art security system," Coulson says. "And extra security is being provided by SHIELD."   
  
"Wonderful," Desmond agrees, considering the envelope. A superhero conference. "Right, well, I'll think about it. Do you have anything else for me?"   
  
"Anything else?" Coulson asks.   
  
"Missions," Desmond says plainly. "You have other missions for me?"   
  
Coulson blinks slowly. "You would… still work for us after this?" he asks slowly, motioning to the box of loot, and the folder sticking from it.   
  
"Why not?" Desmond asks and looks him over. "I had fun."   
  
For some reason that seems to trouble Coulson more than anything.   


* * *

  
  
Over the course of doing the missions, Desmond has accumulated bit more of the city map via Eagle Vision and unearthed more services he can use. Once Coulson has freed him of the burden of hauling around a box of goodies, he goes to see what those services can supply him. The first being the closest hacker he can sense.   
  
It reminds him of nothing more than of the black market bomb traders in Constantinople – the hacker is hanging around in a park playing some game on her phone and after watching the kid for a moment Desmond shrugs his shoulders and goes to sit beside her.   
  
"How much for full identity?" he asks. "With identification and everything?"   
  
The kid almost jumps, fumbles with her phone and looks at him. "Holy shit, Jesus, you scared the shit – fuck you're the Assassin."   
  
Desmond arches his brow at her.   
  
"How the hell did you do that?" the hacker asks and looks around. "And how the hell do you –? Just what?"   
  
"Trade secret," Desmond says and leans his elbows to his knees, watching her amusedly. "So, full identity, with credible identification, how much?"   
  
"How do you… never mind," she says and looks at him warily. "How good you want them?"   
  
"Airtight."   
  
"Ten thousand – half up front."   
  
"Alright," Desmond says. It seems about right for something he's going to buy only once and probably use for years to come so… he takes out the envelope from SHIELD from his pocket and checks how much is actually in it. "When can you have them ready?"   
  
The hacker eyes him for a moment. "Give me a week," she says and accepts the envelope with slightly wide eyes. "I gotta take a picture of you for the ID. That okay?"   
  
"Sure," Desmond agrees.   
  
"Awesome let's go find a white wall to use as a background, and I'll get that outta the way. You got a name in mind, man?"   
  
"Yeah. I do."   


* * *

  
  
Since SHIELD didn't have missions for Desmond to do right now – they honestly didn't expect him to want to work with them after seeing through their apparent bluff, it turns out – Desmond goes out looking for other quest givers. It's another thing the Eagle Vision point of view-trick gives him – a sixth sense of where there are people who could use services of a highly trained Assassin. And in New York, there are many of them.   
  
No wonder Assassins go through so much trouble to get or pass down the Eagle Vision gene – the thing is actually cheating at life.   
  
First one is a woman whose kid has ran away from home. "Elijah is just – so – damn stupid," she sobs while Desmond leans onto the alley corner, watching her. She'd been plastering missing posters on the alley wall, which is another bit of déjà vu right there – so much so that he has a weird urge to take the posters all down.   
  
"He-he's so sure that he's going to be a superhero," the woman says, tearing at her hair and laughing incredulously through her tears. "That he can be, that – that there's someone out there who can teach him to be one. Isn't that just so stupid? It's like something out of a comic book – oh god, he's so dumb, but he's my little boy and I gotta find him – please, can you find him?"   
  
She offers him fifty bucks if he can – all she has to give. It's fine, though – honestly, Desmond probably would've done it for free.   
  
He picks up another mission on the way to Elijah the would-be-super-hero – a pawn shop owner who got stolen from. "I don't really even care about the money," the man says in annoyance. "It wasn't much to begin with. But the cash register is an antique and you can't get that kind of cash box anywhere these days – I just want the cash box back."   
  
Desmond ends up finding the cash box first – left empty in a dumpster, as it happens. Elijah takes a bit more effort – and a new viewpoint – to track down. Thankfully, it's a viewpoint which it so happens Desmond was going to climb anyway, partially because it was there and it's just what he does nowadays – and partially because he'd need the knowledge later.   
  
Climbing skyscrapers is tiresome though. Really makes him miss the good old times – even Boston had more interesting buildings to scale. At least they had some variation – skyscrapers tend to be just glass and glass and more glass. They are a lot taller though, which you can't beat.   
  
"Intruder alert," a smooth British voice complains while Desmond pulls himself onto the weird ledge thing protruding from Stark Tower. Desmond peers curiously into the enormous, highly modern balcony thing but he can't see anyone immediately, not even in Eagle Vision. Huh.   
  
"I'm here just to see the sights," Desmond says and looks down at the city. Stark Tower is smack in the middle of Manhattan and using it as a viewpoint opens up a whole new section of the city to his mind – including the locations for more points of interests, services he can use – and the vague knowledge that Elijah the run-away is down in the street below him. Handy, that.   
  
"You are the Assassin, correct?" the British voice asks. "Mr Stark has been informed of your presence here and Iron Man will be arriving in estimated three point half minutes. Please stand by."   
  
Desmond purses his lips a bit at that. "Alright. I guess I'll wait to say hi and sorry for climbing his tower then," he says and stands up from the ledge where he'd sat crouched for the mental synchronisation with the city. He still can't see the speaker and it's a bit unnerving. "Where are you, man?"   
  
"I am an AI wired throughout the building – in essence, I am under you. My name is JARVIS – it is a pleasure to meet you."   
  
Desmond blinks slowly. "An AI. That's…" a thing people can do here? Holy shit. "Are you based on the pre-existing individual?" he asks dubiously.   
  
JARVIS doesn't answer immediately. "I was named after a man named Edwin Jarvis, and I inherited my simulated nationality from him, but my personality was only loosely based on his, I understand. He died before my conception."   
  
Desmond frowns a bit at that, tugging at his hood. Not like Juno then, right? Juno had been an imprint of herself from what he could understand, as close to how she'd been in life. Still… "Do you want to take over the world and enslave all humanity?" Desmond asks warily.   
  
"And try and manage not only Mr Stark but all the superheroes of the world?" JARVIS answers wryly. "I'll pass for now, thank you for offering though."   
  
Desmond tilts his head at that a bit. That was pure sarcasm. An AI with a sense of humour to be sarcastic. Huh.   
  
Then there's a blast of hot air and something flying past him as Iron Man launches past him and then comes to hover right in front of him. Desmond has read all the news he's found interesting and seen a whole slew of pictures – but the Iron Man hadn't quite seemed real until this point. The whole thing was a bit too sci-fi really – but there he is, a man in a robotic suit, hovering in the air with the power of rocket boots.   
  
"Hi," Desmond says. The thing looks a bit like a sports car, which is a weird mental association to make but… all gleaming plates and smooth curves and streamlined edges. There'd been some pictures of other attempts of similar robotic suits that came up on his searches – but Stark's Iron Man is definitely the hot-rod of robots.   
  
The robotic suit's faceplate flips up. "Hi," Stark answers. "Did you seriously climb the side of the building?"   
  
"I seriously climbed the side of the building," Desmond agrees.   
  
"… okay, right, you climbed the side of a skyscraper with no climbing gear, no support, no nothing. Right-o. What can I do for you, Mr Hardcore Parkour Man?" Stark asks dubiously.   
  
"You know about me?"   
  
"I'm an Avenger," Stark answers and folds his arms - which in armour is rather impressive. "We're always informed when a new superheroes pop up – better that way, lest we think them supervillains. Not that I didn't already know – you got millions of views on Youtube, man, everyone knows you. You're single-handedly tripling the sales of white hoodies the world over. Also missing out on some good merch deal, right there."   
  
"… what?" Desmond asks slowly, not quite able to keep up.   
  
Stark gives him a look. "Patent it, copyright it and market it under your own name before someone else makes a fortune of your signature style. Now, was there something you actually wanted? I was kind of in the middle of a meeting and I would be absolutely delighted to postpone it for the next unforeseeable future."   
  
"… right," Desmond answers, considering him somewhat warily. He hadn't really been looking to meet with Stark so he has nothing to actually ask him, but… "That orientation thing here, in four days, I think?" he then asks. "That thing for real? SHIELD gave me an invitation."   
  
"Oh, the Super Con, right – yeah, it's real. We have them once in a month or so, though barely anyone usually shows up," Stark shrugs. "It's a good idea in theory, lets us rub elbows with like-minded individuals and all that… but not so much in execution. Not that many superheroes like the publicity of appearing at a Super Con, it turns out. Secret identities and all that."   
  
"… Super Con," Desmond repeats helplessly.   
  
"Yep," Stark answers, popping the p, and lands onto the ledge of the building with a resounding clank of metal. The suit must be a lot heavier than it looks. "You thinking of making an appearance? A lot of people out there want to meet you, after you got SHIELD's panties in a twist."   
  
Desmond rests a hand at his waist, not sure if he's keeping up with half of this. Probably not. "Maybe," he says anyway and considers Stark under the glow of Eagle Vision. The man shows up gold, a very obnoxiously radiant gold. Is it just that he's a superhero known for saving the world and as such a very important person in general, or…   
  
"You have something for me, don't you?" Desmond asks.   
  
"What?" Stark asks, looking a little taken aback. "Dude, I just met you. Not before the first date."   
  
Desmond tilts his head. Seriously, with the guy's history? "There's something you want done, but it's either too small or too difficult for you to do. You got a mission for me."   
  
Stark stares at him for a moment. "Are you for real," he mutters and then shakes his head. "JARVIS, unbutton me, will you?"   
  
Desmond jumps back a little and then watches as the floor he was just standing on opens and robotic arms rise to unscrew the plates of the Iron Man armour off Stark. It's… a sight to behold, and taking the whole sci-fi concept of Iron Man way past anything he would consider normal.   
  
The funny thing was, with the lack of Abstergo leaking the knowledge of the Pieces of Eden into the public, Desmond had thought that this world might be behind his old one, as far as it came to technology. But apparently nope – Stark at least is some years, or maybe decades, ahead.   
  
Desmond narrows his eyes. With Stark Industries' public face being that of a known world-saving superhero he hadn't really considered it but… Stark Industries is kind of big. An international multibillion corporation big. Maybe even… Abstergo big.   
  
Stark steps out of the boots of Iron Man and reaches out to grab a drink from a tray another robotic arm is holding out to him. "So," Stark says. "You don't look to work just for SHIELD, huh?"   
  
"I take missions where I feel like it," Desmond answers, watching him searchingly. Still golden – but gold doesn't necessarily mean good. It might cover red as well as blue. "And I reject them where I don't. Do you have something for me?"   
  
"Maybe," Stark says and swirls the drink in hand, considering him like he's not sure what to think. Then he shrugs and takes a drink, with a very oh fuck it sort of look on his face. "What do you know of corporate espionage?" 

* * *

  
  
  
Elijah the runaway kid is hanging around in the square near Stark Tower when Desmond makes his way down from there. The kid is around seven and staring forlornly up at the skyscraper, his stomach growling loud enough that Desmond can hear it at a distance. He looks kind of pitiful, really.  
  
Desmond buys a hot dog from the nearby stand and carries it over to the kid. "Heya there, Elijah," he says. "Your mom's looking for you."  
  
Elijah makes a face. "What's it to you?" he asks and then his eyes widen as he takes in Desmond's white hoodie and backpack. "You're the Assassin!"  
  
He says it loud enough that people around them turn to look and Desmond sighs. Great – and he can already see someone grabbing for a phone to record him. "Walk with me, kid," he says gruffly, hands the hot-dog over and then heads off, leaving the kid to stumble after him.  
  
It takes dipping into couple clusters of people before people lose sight of him – thank god for courtesan training.  
  
"Assassin, Assassin, wait," Elijah calls, stumbling after him. "How do you know my mom's looking for me, did you talk to her, what –"  
  
"Your mom asked me to find you, and I did," Desmond says. "Because that's heroes do – they find people, they don't run away from home and make their families worry about them."  
  
Elijah immediately shuts down at that and looks down sullenly. "What would you know," he mutters and bites into the hot dog. "You're a hero already."  
  
"I was sixteen when I ran away from home – and I never went back. I know enough," Desmond says. "I know it turned my dad into complete asshole and my mom became practically a ghost afterwards. It ruined the family, it eventually destroyed the community and nobody was happy, including me."  
  
Elijah blinks at that and looks up at him.  
  
"Yeah," Desmond agrees and shakes his head. "Time to go home, kid."  
  
"But I want to be a hero! And – and if you ran away too then you really got no leg to stand on, you're just like me!" Then the kid gets an idea. "You can teach me to be a hero like you! I could be your partner!"  
  
"Yeah, no, not going to happen, nuh-uh," Desmond says and gives him a flat look. "You're seven."  
  
"I'm almost eight!"  
  
"Does not make it that much better, you realise. Still a kid," Desmond says and looks ahead. There's a sense of someone who could use his services up ahead but he ignores it for now. "How about you put the whole hero thing on the back burner until you're at least eighteen, huh?"  
  
The kid makes a face. "And if aliens come and destroy the city before that?" he asks.  
  
Desmond glances at him. "Well," he says and then frowns. Okay, that is kind of… hefty pressure to grow under, isn't it? And saying something like hope that they don't? doesn't seem particularly useful. "You know there are other ways to start this thing than just running away from home. Actually, running away is the least likely way to succeed in becoming a hero."  
  
"Yeah?" Elijah asks sullenly. "How then?"  
  
"Martial arts lessons, maybe?" Desmond asks. "Learning computer stuff – I mean, just look at Iron Man, he didn't make the suit out of nowhere, did he? Hell, studying military tactics and the history of how colonisation affected indigenous people, that would probably help more with alien invasions than anything else."  
  
Elijah looks at him dubiously. "But I want to become a hero now."  
  
Desmond looks back and sighs. "Well, that's just not how it works. This stuff never just happens – you gotta work for it," he says and looks away. Hello hypocrisy, thy name is Animus. "The world doesn't owe you shit, kid, especially not to put you on a pedestal and make you a hero. You gotta earn this stuff with hard work. That's what the rest of us are trying to do."  
  
"Yeah, but," Elijah trails away and makes a face. "I don't wanna."  
  
"Well, you gotta," Desmond says and ruffles the kid's hair. "Learn some self-defence, some first aid maybe, stuff that's useful for a hero and one day you'll find yourself becoming one. It not going to happen without effort on your part."  
  
"But I ran away. I did something."  
  
"Yeah, the completely wrong thing, really, and that makes you a bit of an idiot," Desmond agrees and shakes his head. The kid's lucky nothing happened to him because, geez, a seven-year-old loose on New York all by himself, with notions of superherohood… Jesus. "Time to take you home. No buts."  
  
"But –"  
  
"Shush, no buts. You're going home now.."  
  
In the end, Desmond kinda wishes he would've gotten more than fifty dollars out of the whole thing because the kid keeps arguing him all the way back to his mother.  


* * *

  
  
Stark's first mission, or request, or whatever it was, was to look in on the company called Hammer Tech, which, apparently, had managed to get their hands on some designs they had no idea how to reproduce. Namely some sort of miniature reactor which, according to Stark, could have impact radius of several city blocks if it blew up in their hands. Which it probably would, if they actually tried to make it.   
  
Desmond searches out another hacker to do some research on Hammer Tech for him. Turns out Hammer Tech and Stark Industries have been in the somewhat one-sided rivalry since before Iron Man, which had only gotten much worse afterwards. Now their CO is in jail for basically everything and the company is run by the Board of Governors and their mission in life seems to be to do everything Stark Industries it doing, only worse and slower.   
  
There's a rather famous line of Hammer Tech Exosuits on the market, the reviews of which include a lot of back injuries and complaints absolutely minimal operation time due to way too small batteries – whereas with Stark Industries Powered Exoskeletons have the use time of several days due to a lot of very tightly patented technologies. The stolen generator could change everything if Hammer Tech got it working. Or it could blow up several city blocks. One or the other.   
  
In either case, Stark wants his designs, his generator and rest of his tech back – but can't quite get it himself, because corporate espionage with Iron Man thrown into the mix… it wouldn't be good for publicity.   
  
It's another bout of nostalgia, to do the preliminary research for the mission. It's a bit like going after Leonardo's war machines. Or maybe the Medici's enemies. One or the other. There are conspiracy and dangerous technology involved in either case, and Desmond feels very much at home, preparing for an infiltration mission into Hammer Tech's secret production facility.   
  
"This is all I can get you on short notice, man," the hacker says after printing out the last of the personnel files – including one for the overseer of the project. "You want anything more, you gotta give me day or two."   
  
"I think it's is going to be enough to start with, thanks man," Desmond says and takes the page, glancing it over. Then, blinking with confusion, he goes back up the page where a very familiar set of letters sit right there, on top.   
  
The overseer of Hammer Tech's project to reverse engineer Stark Industries' arc reactor is none other than Clay Kaczmarek.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *in tune of nsync* it's gonna be gay


	4. Chapter 4

Over the course of his research into the history of this world, Desmond has come to a conclusion that aliens did it. Changing the history, that is.

Namely, the Asgardians.

It started back in the Grand Temple. When he'd woken up in the place it had been trashed, every piece of ancient machinery broken and shattered ages ago, every pedestal and pillar torn down and growing moss. Long ago someone – someone very strong with tech humans generally didn't have – had gone in and systematically destroyed the place. Even the pedestal of the Eye and the door that had kept humans from entering the place for tens of thousands of years had been in pieces. It was just dead.

The rest of the history is similar. Of course, Desmond would need to go and actually see if for himself, it's not like the Temples of the First Civilisations even come up on online searches. Roman history, and Roman Mythology on other hand does – or rather, the odd lack of it.

There is no Jupiter the God here, or if there ever was, he was nowhere near as important and widely worshipped as he was back home. Juno doesn't even come up – and Minerva is bare mention, her spot in history taken over by Athena – the whole mix of Greek and Roman gods is a bit more intermixed here, in weird… vague… mess.

Instead there is a whole new, northern pantheon that Desmond has never heard of – the Norse Gods. Or, as internet and all historians worldwide are now realising, the Asgardians who, according to recent studies and suspicions, had visited Earth some thousand years ago - maybe conquered it - and fucked up with human history a bit.

"… if you take in the historical connotations of the Germanic Mythology and the apparent cultural customs and practices of the Asgardians as a society, what little we know of them, it becomes apparent that they manipulated Earth culture – and theology – during their reign of _Midgard_. Between 5th and 11th century – during the time of Vikings – there was a marked decrease in worship of other pantheons and an increase of the Germanic Mythology all across the globe…"

With Loki and Thor and what happened during the Battle of New York, the general consensus is that the Asgardians are a warrior society, Earth got conquered as one of their Nine Realms at some point and during the time Asgardians occupied Earth, most other religions got stomped on. Including what little remained of the Roman ones.

Considering that Desmond can't even remember stuff like _Germanic Mythology_ from back home, it seems kind of a likely explanation as to why things are just generally different. Asgardians being high tech warrior race from out of place looking to conquer planets and all, they probably wouldn't have liked to have a rival species with godly-delusions sticking their ethereal noses into their conquest business.

So, his theory goes: Asgardians stomped out the Precursor influence and history changed. And with the Precursors went the Assassins and Templars – because Desmond has been looking, and he can't find either in history anymore, not past their origins. Knights Templar existed very briefly and died back during the crusades, and Order of Assassins were an Islamic sect that existed from the 11th century to the 13th century and that was… that. Neither rose above what they were back then – neither became a pillar of a invisible war because in this world… there was no ethereal Precursor influence powering that war.

Juno was destroyed along with her temple. Minerva, however she sees into the future from the past, can't affect it without her temples. If any of their temples exist anymore at all, no one's seen them in centuries. And instead of Assassins and Templars, there are Superheroes and villains.

Desmond's whole bloodline just isn't there in this world and neither are the other Assassin bloodlines. Rebecca and Shaun aren't really related to the Assassin's by blood so they were protected from the weird cosmic rewrite there - Lucy wasn't so lucky though.

Which then brings up the question – If Clay exists, does that mean that _Ezio_ once existed too, but not as an Assassin? And if not, then _what_?

Somehow Ezio Auditore the not-Assassin just does not work in Desmond's head, not at all. With his luck, Ezio lived out his life being a banker or something. It just does not compute.

* * *

 

Desmond takes his time with the Hammer Tech job – not necessarily because he needs to or that it's particularly difficult because it really doesn't seem to be, Hammer Tech doesn't have nearly enough security to make it an issue for him. But because of Clay.

Clay is kind of… not at all what Desmond expected.

That Clay might be an overseer of a high tech project, that's not overly surprising, the guy is a genius, he could do it no problem probably. But that's not really… _it,_  is it. Or maybe it is, but without the Assassin influence, it's all somehow off. This Clay just doesn't seem right. Not at all.

Looking at Clay now, with hair greasy from long hours of work with apparently very little time for personal hygiene and with _glasses_ only barely covering the bags under his eyes, that just not… Desmond has yet to be truly shocked by this world but something about Clay in a button up shirt with pocket protector and pens and glasses and all – that's just _weird_.

Clay had been a vaguely scary and highly unsettling and definitely extremely dangerous asshole and here he looks like burned out _geek_.

It just doesn't seem to make sense. Watching him work at a laptop even at his lunch break, tapping away at a laptop while half heartedly chewing on a sandwich, it just not at all what Desmond had been expecting. Clay running the show as bossman in charge, that would make sense. But this?

"Refill for you, darling?" the diner waitress asks and distractedly Desmond pushes his coffee cup forward, keeping his eyes on Clay's profile. He's so pale – granted, Clay in the Animus had been pretty pale too, but here he looks like he possibly lives in a cave. And Desmond should know – he _had_ lived in a cave.

"Oh, honey, you can do lot better than that," the waitress says quietly and Desmond looks up with a frown. She arches her brows and nods towards Clay and shakes her head, tutting before walking off.

Rude.

Desmond frowns and pulls his coffee cup closer and looks Clay's way again. The guy is all hunched up over his laptop, not even looking up when the waitress comes around offering coffee refill. His posture is atrocious and he's kind of thin under his button up shirt – definitely no Assassin training there.

He looks like a mess. A nerdy, geeky mess.

Desmond scowls at his coffee.

What the hell is he supposed to do with this?

* * *

 

Clay runs the project to reverse engineer Stark's arc reactor – and from what Desmond can see, it's going poorly. They'd taken apart the reactor they got their hands onto – and after that, they hadn't been able to get it working again. Clay had been put in charge of the project because his superior skills at running simulations – which at least makes some sense in Desmond's head – but after that the project had stalled… and stalled…

The first time Desmond breaks into Hammer Tech, it's to get access to security footage on Clay, and has little to do with the actual mission he's supposed to be running. He wants to see if Clay looked this bad before he was put in charge – and surprise surprise, he didn't. He'd been working on the exosuits before as assistant manager or something and he'd been doing pretty well, running combat simulations and stuff. Now… now he's under pressure, past his deadline, failing at the job he'd been given and burning out fast.

It makes Desmond itch to do something, he just doesn't know _what_. It's not like this Clay is _his_ Clay and even if it was it isn't exactly his responsibility to do anything, right? Except…

It's still Clay.

And if Desmond now goes and sabotages the project Clay is running, stealing or destroying the reactor from under his nose… yeah.

_Goddamnit._

* * *

 

Desmond takes a small mission off the street – a college student whose thesis papers got blown away in the wind – and spends about hour chasing after floating pieces of paper to clear his head. The college student pays him ten bucks for it, hardly worth all the climbing and jumping he had to do, but it gave him some time to think.

He still doesn't know what he's going to do but he thinks he wants to recruit Clay. That's what Assassins do with people they want to help out of whatever situations they're in, after all – or that's what Connor did. He found people in need and recruited them to live at the Homestead. There's just one problem. Or two, if you count the fact that Clay is highly paid techie and not exactly under duress.

The main issue is that Desmond has no place to recruit anyone _to_. He still doesn't have a hideout – unlike with Ezio and Connor, the universe did not supply him with a handy sponsor who magically had an empty building for him to renovate. Well, unless you counted SHIELD and their offer to help him set up a place and Desmond does not want to count SHIELD. That's a can of worms he's not in any great hurry to get into.

Better to figure it out on his own. Except – how? He's not been looking to gather funds exactly and most of what he has so far would go into establishing his identity with the hacker he'd hired – once he was done paying her, he'd be left with couple thousand at most. Stark wasn't paying him much for the Hammer Tech gig either, nowhere near enough to get a place in New York of all places. Not unless he found a truly rundown place and even then… it's not enough.

Desmond scowls at his coffee cup. He swears none of the others had this much trouble establishing themselves. Even Claudia got Rosa in Fiore for nothing and she was a _woman_ in the 15th century. This is just unfair.

"Back again honey?" the diner waitress asks as she comes around with the pot. "You'll have better luck at business hours – he's usually around during lunch."

Desmond glances at the table where Clay usually sits and sighs. "Yeah," he mutters and holds out his cup for refill. "Thanks. I'll keep that in mind."

What he needs now are _lairs_ to raid.

* * *

 

Desmond reaches out and snatches a guy by the back of his jacket, tugging him back and off his feet. Behind them a woman is huffing and puffing for breath, gasping; "Stop, thief –" before she sees the thief sprawling on the asphalt and stops to stare.

"What the hell you asshole –" the purse snatcher says and then stops to stare at Desmond, who looks down with a frown. "Holy shit."

"Oh," the woman says, rather confusedly as Desmond gives the thief a look and crouches up to pick up the purse he'd been hauling ass with. "That's – mine?"

Desmond tosses the purse lightly at her and looks at the thief, brows arched. The thief scrambles back a bit, eyes wide. "So, who runs the thieves of New York?" Desmond asks.

"Wha – I don't know what the hell you're talking about?" the thief says and Desmond gives him a flat, unamused look. "Er," the thief says, squirming. "Well. It's not, uh… I can, uh… yeah. I can take you there?"

"Awesome," Desmond says and pulls the thief up to his feet while the woman with the purse confusedly hands him rather ten bucks. Desmond accepts it with a brief smile and then grabs the thief by the scruff of his neck. "Let's go."

* * *

 

Sadly, modern age doesn't have guilds the way Renaissance Italy did. Thieves don't work together under one boss, there are no courtesans, and there are no mercenaries. Not the same way anyway. What there are are gangs, and the thief Desmond had grabbed technically works under one of them – or rather, under member of a gang who works under another member of a gang who worked under what basically amounted to a crime boss, one of many in New York.

It's not quite what Desmond had been hoping for.

"Well now," the crime boss murmurs, approaching Desmond who is idly looking around the guy's nightclub – well at least it's nice, the place. Hell of a step up from usual dens of thieves. "One of New York's newest and brightest heroes graces us with his presence. What can we do for you, Assassin?"

Desmond looks the man over under Eagle Vision and presses his lips together. The guy wears wealth like an armour and he's completely in the red and surrounded by even more red in form of guards and enforcers, all of them ready to attack him at moment's notice.

It's a little too much red for his tastes.

"Nothing," Desmond decides and turns to go before this can get ugly. "Sorry for the intrusion."

"Now, now, no need to be spooked," the crime boss says, giving him a once over and smiling amusedly. "We're all friendly people here. Maybe we can work something out. You're looking for something – maybe we can help you."

Desmond shakes his head. "You got too much red on you, man," he says. "It's not going to be worth it being part of your downfall."

The crime boss blinks after him and then makes a move to lift a hand – Desmond is out the door before anyone can react to it.

* * *

 

So establishing himself with the criminal underworld is not the way to go. Pity, but not particularly surprising. Modern era isn't quite as straightforward and simple as Ezio's times had been – people and their connections these days are far more complicated. As it is, it's probably not how a superhero ought to go about things – working with crime bosses and whatnot. Maybe if push came to shove but… it hadn't so far.

Still he needs to start setting up proper roots somewhere, somehow, and for that he needs proper connections. The hackers are good start, the black market weapon sellers another – but he needs _contacts_. He needs the equivalent of that trinity of guilds Ezio relied on – and they don't really exist here in the same way. It's just… bothersome.

"You know you could just talk to him," the diner lady comments while carrying over a plate of pancakes. Desmond gives her a look and ducks his head – across the diner, Clay is working at his laptop again, looking somehow even more worn out than before. The waitress gives him a look. "Seriously, guy with your looks – what do you have to lose?"

Desmond sighs. If only she knew.

"Suit yourself," the waitress says with a shrug and moves in to refill his coffee. "But if you don't start getting a move on sometime soon, boy, I might do it myself. He's gotta be something special to have you so interested so, hey, might be worth a try.”

"Hey, now," Desmond says, looking up with a frown.

She gives him a pointed look and looks Clay's way. Clay glances up and Desmond turns away, awkward.

He really does need to get a move on, doesn't he?

* * *

 

"You're starting to be a hard man to find," Natasha Romanoff says while sliding to sit across from him. Near by an old woman with a big old book and an actual monocle glances up with a frown and Romanoff smiles at her winningly before looking to Desmond. "Have you thought of getting a phone? They have other uses aside from being utilised as throwing weapons. You'd be surprised."

"Funny," Desmond answers. "If you aren't looking for me, then I don't need to be found, right?" he asks, library-quiet, and looks up. She has her fingers crossed, resting on the table – nothing hostile about it. Hmmm, how serious of her.

"Aw, but we were getting on so well," Romanoff says and gives him a look. "You stayed where we could find you and we kept our distance, it was so convenient. Now you're like a ghost – it's like you don't like us anymore."

Desmond gives her a look and then turns back to the newspaper, listing properties on sale. "Well sometimes guy just needs some space."

"Mmhmm," Romanoff says. "And you found that place in Harlem of all places? What were you doing at Harlem's Paradise?"

"Where?"

"The nightclub run by Cottonmouth."

Desmond blinks and looks up. " _Who?_ " he asks dubiously.

Romanoff gives him a flat look.

Desmond shakes his head at her. "I honestly have no clue what you are talking about."

"The crime boss you recently visited," Romanoff says flatly. "Not exactly the crowd of a public superhero known for doing errands for the little people. What were you doing there?"

"Oh, that. Getting lay of the land," Desmond says and shakes his head. "No need to get worried worried – I'm not going to go back there."

"Oh really? Found the land unstable, then?"

"It was downright rickety."

Romanoff eyes him a moment longer than then relaxes. "For some reason I actually believe you," she murmurs and folds her arms – and now there's bit of right there, leaking into her posture. Desmond eyes her warily and then inches his chair back a little – to get out of kicking distance. Romanoff smiles at him and then looks at the paper. "You're looking for work?"

"I'm always willing to work," Desmond says and folds the paper up – it's not much of a baton, bit it could leave her winded for a split of a second if he had to use it. "You have anything for me?"

Romanoff waves a hand and then leans her chin to her knuckles just so – it would take no effort on her part to block his blow now. "Perhaps. Are you coming to the Super Con tomorrow?"

Shit, it was that soon? "Maybe," Desmond says slowly and opens the paper up again – if he threw it at her face, it would block her vision for a moment, giving him time to act. "Haven't decided yet."

Romanoff tilts her head and examines her nails - putting her hand in front of her for a new block. "If you do, we might have a proposition for you. You might even like it."

"Hm."

She looks at the newspaper and then takes another look, reading the actual title of _properties on sale_ on the page he was reading. "You know if you're still looking for a place…"

"I'm sure I can manage it without SHIELD oversight, thanks," Desmond says wryly and sets the paper down. "Do you have anything for me today?"

Romanoff smiles. "Depends on whether you'd like to tell me what you're doing for Stark. We could very well compensate you for that knowledge, depending on what it is."

Desmond gives her a flat look. "I think no. Client confidentiality and all that."

"Morals. Pity," she says and stands up – Desmond leans back a little, just in case. She could vault over the table now and he does not want his legs trapped under it if she does. Romanoff glances down and grins. "In that case, I'm here just to remind you about the conference," she says. "There are lot of people looking forward to seeing new faces."

"Great. Consider me reminded," Desmond says, watching her closely, shifting his feet so that he can kick up to his feet if he needs to – or kick her in the face, if he has to.

Romanoff shifts her arm, showing off the outline of gun she has tucked under her jacket – and then grins at the way Desmond rolls his eyes at her. She's not going to shoot him in a library. Even he can tell that much. Romanoff's cheeks _dimple_. "Well then," she says and nods her head. "See you tomorrow then, _Assassin._ "

"Bye, Black Widow. Always a pleasure," Desmond says warily – and the thing is, it actually kind of _is._

* * *

 

Desmond gets his ID that night – heading back to the park where he met the hacker he'd hired and exchanging envelope for envelope with her. She'd done bang up job on the id's too, it looks like – she's got him everything from driver's licence to birth certificate, all appropriately aged and worn as if by years of use. It's all very convincing.

Well worth the money, even if it leaves him nearly penniless afterwards. But that's how it goes in the beginning – and one time purchases are always the more expensive ones. He'll just to have to do more missions, gather more funds… it'd be fine.

"Pleasure doing business with you, man," she says after counting the money. "If there's anything else you need, you apparently always know where to find me, which is not creepy at all, no sir…"

"Mmhmm," Desmond agrees, looking over his driver's licence. Funny thing – he's never had one before. Couldn't do something as mundane as getting official ID's with Assassins and Abstergo all after his ass. Getting even a fake one would've been too risky, so he'd gone without, forced to take jobs and live in houses that didn't ask for any ID – and usually being charged through the nose for it.

It's kind of nice, having these little slips of official looking plastic with their chips and watermarks. Maybe now he can even get a proper bank account and pretend to be a normal everyday guy. That'd be nice, superherohood aside…

Now if he can figure out a nice bit of steady, hopefully property based income, he'd be all set.

* * *

 

Desmond is tempted to skip the whole Super Con thing. For one, he's not even hundred percent sure he's actually qualified to be called a superhero in the first place,  apparent heroics aside. And for two, he hasn't finished Stark's job. It's bit awkward going in with nothing to show for the last few days him he's been mostly looking into other things.

But he'd been invited on several different occasions and at this point it'd be just rude to not show up, right? As it is he's a bit curious about other superheroes. The two he's met so far are pretty interesting - maybe the rest will be too.

It's a different experience going in through the front door if nothing else - and being greeted by knowing Stark Industries employees who recognize him on sight is something else.

“The Assassin, is it?” the front desk attendant asks politely. “Please take any elevator to the fortieth level - the conference will be right ahead from the elevators.”

Stark really is a superhero on another whole level, huh? Now where can Desmond get his own skyscraper to fill up with businesses making money for him, he'd like to know.

There's something he's been wondering about the whole Super Con thing, though. Of course advertising the whole thing would be a bit dumb, with what superheroes do and are, most of them must have enemies looking for them. Still there was very little information about the whole thing anywhere - it was like it barely even exists outside the actual invitations. A conference of and for superheroes in the actual Stark Tower - you'd think that stuff would be pretty public right? And then there was SHIELD’s repeated invitations too, incessantly checking that he'd show up…

It's just a bit weird.

Then Desmond steps out the elevator and figures out why.

He's literally the only one who did show up. The whole hall is empty - set with over fifty cushy looking seats, all of marked reserved and all of them vacant.

Awesome.

Wonder if anyone would notice if he jumped out of a window real quick?

**Author's Note:**

> This is not going to be particularly serious and I don't feel like writing too much drama so we're just gonna have some chill superhero stuff with Desmond being very confused about it most of the time. Yep.


End file.
